Day 33: Gettysburg, PA

Stop 26 / State 15:  Gettysburg, PA

Today's drive was a short 81 miles, much of it on smaller, country roads.  Shortly before reaching Gettysburg, we crossed the state line.

  Just as soon as we were set up, we took off for the National Military Park. 

First stop was the Visitors Center where we went through the museum, saw a short film and visited the Cyclorama (below).

Then we went on the self guided tour of the battleground.  It's unfortunate that they had to pick such a beautiful location for such an ugly battle.  The area was huge and it seemed like there were monuments everywhere we looked.  There seemed to be a monument for every small unit that participated in the battle (and for every larger unit right up the chain - every state had a monument).

 

Out on the battlefield, there were many barns and other structures that were there during the battle.

 

A confederate canon on Seminary Ridge.

The South Carolina Monument on Seminary Ridge:

We took a hike up to Big Round Top.  These woods are very much like the

park where we have our Trailer.

The view from Little Round Top:

Of course, the biggest monument in the whole place is ... Pennsylvania!

Visited the Gettysburg National Cemetery and found it interesting that the monument to Lincoln's Gettysburg Address isn't at the site where he gave the speech because they built something else there.

The Soldiers National Monument was built at the site where Lincoln gave his speech:

And here's our trailer picture.  Can't believe how lush the forest is.  A neighbor just showed us how to spot poison ivy (looks surprisingly like poison oak - good to know).

 

-J-